


Degrees of Separation

by jdjunkie



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-10-29
Updated: 2010-10-29
Packaged: 2017-10-12 23:03:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,584
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/130091
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jdjunkie/pseuds/jdjunkie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jack's going to Washington and the team is moving on. Daniel tries to figure it all out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Degrees of Separation

Jack is due to leave for Washington and a new big chair and bigger office tomorrow. His office at Cheyenne Mountain is devoid of everything that made it Jack’s for the short time it was actually his. Daniel leans against the open doorway and glances around. No certificates on the walls, no photographs on the desk. The paperweight Cassie made him is gone.

 _“It’ll be okay, Daniel.” Jack breathes the words against his mouth, reaches for Daniel’s sweat-sheened body and pulls him close. “Just the start of another chapter.”_

 _“Is it okay if I skip ahead to see if the story has a happy ending?” Daniel asks, shifting to rest his head on Jack’s chest and holding him in return. Holding on._

 _“No peeking. I can’t stand people who do that with books.”_

 _“I’m an ending wuss.”_

 _They both chuckle and nestle in closer. This is what Daniel will miss the most._

 _“Have a little faith,” Jack whispers, stroking Daniel’s arm._

 _“I’d rather have this,” Daniel says, softly._

Daniel sighs and shoves off from the doorjamb. He should be leaving but he can’t. Not just yet. Jack became The Man here. They talked, debated and argued here. Daniel fell in love here, or at least realized he’d fallen in love, after his return from almost-heaven for a second time. He stood naked and uncertain until he saw his own feelings reflected in Jack’s eyes for that fleeting, private moment before Jack reached for the flag.

“Dr. Jackson?”

Walter. Finishing up his day and making sure all is in order for the change of command. The new guy’s called Landry and that’s all Daniel knows about him. That and the fact that he isn’t Jack.

“Anything I can do for you, sir?”

“No. Thanks. I was just ...” He takes one more look and walks away without glancing at Walter, afraid of what the man might see on his face.

>>>> 

He finishes up the last page of his notes for SG-13’s next mission and shuts down his laptop. It’s late and he should eat but isn’t hungry. The day’s work has been unsatisfying . His concentration is shot and that makes him pissed and antsy. Work has always been his solace. But right now, just as it has been for the better part of a decade, work is inextricably linked to Jack.

Jack is all he can think about, despite the fact that 95 per cent of his mental effort is going into not thinking about Jack. It’s exhausting.

“You hungry?”

He looks up to find Sam in jeans and leather jacket, her motorcycle helmet under her arm, smiling at him.  The smile is low-wattage, though, and it isn’t reaching her eyes. Teal’c stands beside her, an implacable, reassuring presence in this maelstrom of change.

“Not really.”

“Me neither,” she sighs.

“I have not been hungry for some time,” Teal’c says, sounding surprised at his own response to the impending loss of his brother-in-arms.

 Sam adopts what Daniel calls her thinky face; forehead furrowed, chin jutting. “You think he’s feeling like this, too?”

No need to ask who “he” is.

“It would be disingenuous if I said ‘like what,’ wouldn’t it?”

“Yeah.”

Daniel shrugs, shoving his hands in the pockets of his pants, leaning back in his chair. “Second-guessing Jack is a fool’s game.”

Sam checks out her helmet. “Oh, I don’t know, Daniel. You’ve always been able to read him better than the rest of us.”

 It’s an innocent enough statement, but Daniel thinks he hears a sharp undertone there and the sideways glance Teal’c  directs Sam’s way confirms it. Daniel can’t pursue this. He’s never gone there with Sam and he doesn’t have the energy or wherewithal to do it now, especially now.  So he sticks to safer, less potentially painful ground. “Well ... if I had to take a guess, I’d say he has mixed feelings. He’s achieved a lot here, although he doesn’t think he has, and he’ll do a great job in Washington, although he doesn’t think he will.”

 “O’Neill continues to underestimate his own considerable skills and achievements. I have always failed to understand why this should be,” Teal’c says, a little exasperation bleeding through his customary calm.

Daniel wishes they weren’t having this conversation. In all the years they’ve been a team, they’ve never really discussed Jack beyond professional boundaries.  Daniel and Teal’c have rarely discussed Jack at all. With Sam, there’s been joint snarking at the man who’s frustrated, surprised, amused and angered them in pretty much equal measure. But that man is the Colonel and General.  Not Jack.  

Daniel is in love with Jack.

“This place is going to be so different without him,” Sam says, and, to Daniel’s horror, he sees tears in her eyes. He can’t cope with Sam’s feelings.  He can barely cope with his own. He loves Jack and his leaving is ripping Daniel to shreds.

“Yeah.”

There’s silence then.

“I’ve put in for Atlantis,” Daniel says, blurting it out because he can’t find the right way or the right time to tell them and it might as well be now. He can’t be here when Jack isn’t here. 

To his surprise, Sam smiles, and it’s a relieved smile, and then she says, quickly and on an anxious breath, “I’m transferring  to R&D at Area 51.”

Teal’c has already made it known that his immediate future lies with Bratac and the Jaffa.

There’s more silence while each of them digests what it means.

What it means is the break-up of the team.

Daniel thought that Sam, of all of them, would still be here. That she would lead a new SG-1 and be the rock they all continued to rely on. While there was a Sam, there was a team for him to come back to.  He feels the sand shifting beneath his feet, the way it did when he lost Sha’uri, and when Jack told him about D.C.

 _“Can you say no?”_

 _“No.”_

 _“Would you, if you could?”_

 _“I don’t know.”_

 _“How long before you leave?”_

 _“About a month.”_

 _“That’s fast.”_

 _“Unusually.”_

 _“They must really want you.”_

 _“They must.”_

 _“I want you more.”_

They’re all moving on.

“Wow.” Daniel says, softly.

“Yeah,” Sam says, equally softly.

“Is it all signed and sealed. Area 51?”

“Not yet. General O’Neill has to finalize details with General Landry, but I don’t foresee any problems. I’m pretty excited actually.”

“That’s good,” Daniel says, trying out a smile. It isn’t good.  It stinks.  He hates that he thinks it stinks. “It’s all going to be very ... different”.

“Is Atlantis confirmed?”

 _Good question._ “Yeah. I think so. Should be. I’m supposed to head out on the Daedalus’s next run.”

“General O’Neill has agreed that you should go?” Teal’c asks, failing to keep the surprise out of his voice.

 _“Over my rotting corpse, Daniel.” He slams the letter down on his desk and gets up to shut his office door._

 _“You have no grounds to refuse. Not now.”_

 _“Oh, I wouldn’t bet on that.”_

 _“Simply saying ‘no’ or ‘over my dead body’ is not going to hack it this time, Jack.”_

 _“The reasons stand. You’re needed here.”_

 _“Am I?”_

“We’ll keep in touch, right? I mean ... this doesn’t mean it’s the end of us. Just the day-to-day us,” Sam says, sounding shocked. This is all happening so fast.

“Right,” Daniel says, trying for an injection of confidence.

 “Right,” Sam confirms, smiling weakly at them both.

Daniel leans forward in his chair, picks up his pen and taps it on his notebook. This conversation hasn’t gone way he expected at all. He looks up at Teal’c. “I think this is where you say, ‘Indeed.’ You know. To make us all feel  ... reassured.”

“If you believe it will help, Daniel Jackson ... indeed.”

Daniel lets out a deep breath and Sam follows suit.

“Yeah.  Not really feeling it,” Daniel says, turning the pen round and round.

“Me neither,” Sam adds.

“Indeed.”

>>>> 

After Sam and Teal’c decide they really should eat something and leave for Teal’c’s favourite Vietnamese restaurant, Teal’c riding pillion, Daniel packs his laptop in its bag, grabs some reference books and heads for home. He’s three blocks from his building when he takes a left instead of a right and stops off to pick up a large vegetarian pizza and a meat feast with extra jalapenos  from the new place Jack discovered last month.

Ten minutes later, he pulls into Jack’s driveway.  There are lights on in every room. Jack is going through the final motions of closing up the house. It’s cold and Daniel can see his breath as he knocks on the door for what will probably be the last time. 

“I brought pizza,” he says unnecessarily, waving the boxes at Jack as he opens the door. If Jack’s surprised to see him there he doesn’t show it. They said goodbye last night with hard loving and soft words.

“So you did.”

Jack waves him in.

Daniel heads for the living room, weaving his way around packing boxes. The sofa and chairs are covered in dust sheets, the coffee table is gone, as are the photographs and medals. It feels as bereft of Jack as Jack’s office. Most of the stuff is going in storage while Jack makes a final decision on what to do with the house.

“I thought we agreed we wouldn’t do this,” Jack calls from the hallway, where he rummages in a packing case and emerges with two plates. Daniel would happily eat out of the box but Jack always prefers to use crockery.

“We did. I reneged. Sorry.”

Jack hands him a plate along with a knowing look. “You’re not.”

“No,” Daniel says, plunking down on the sheet-covered sofa and laying the pizza boxes on the floor, “I’m not.”

“You want a beer?”

“No thanks.”

“No to the beer, yes to the feelings,” Jack says, wryly, sitting next to Daniel. He leans forward to open the boxes. He looks a little tired and his sweatshirt and old jeans are dusty and rumpled. It’s been a long day.

Daniel shoots Jack a warning look. He remembers that conversation. It was one of the first things that came back to him when he returned from ascension the first time. He’s often wondered why; maybe because a memory so painfully sharp overrides anything.

“Yes to the pizza, no to the melodrama,” Daniel says, sounding distracted as he peers at the vegetarian pie and lifts a slice onto his plate.

Jack takes a bite of his pizza and closes his eyes in bliss. “Mmm. S’good. Wonder if Asgard beaming technology works on pizza joints?” He speaks with his mouth full. Normally, that would irritate Daniel half to death.

 “You still heading back to the Mountain tonight?” Daniel asks, after giving Jack a moment alone with his pizza.

“Yeah.  Flight from Peterson is at fuck o’clock and I still have a few things to wrap up before I go.”

“Place feels kinda ... weird ... without you.”

Jack chews for a while. “I haven’t gone yet,” he says eventually, half-teasing and half-chiding.

“Well, it feels like you’ve gone. Office is empty.” Daniel shivers a little. Jack’s probably already turned the heating down to its lowest keep-the-chill-away setting.

“You were in my office? Why? I always tried _not_ to be in my office.”

“Lot happened there. I was naked in there once.”

“Mmmm. That sound was not pizza-related, by the way.”

Daniel huffs a laugh and picks out a small piece of charred bell pepper from its mozzarella nest. “I realized I loved you in that room.”

“Have I ever told you how glad I was you remembered that fact?”

“Told me and showed me.  Descension must have kick-started something in my memory, I guess, although why it didn’t work when I first came back I have no idea. Maybe it was part of some petty punishment by the Others or something. I’m sorry it took me so long to remember. We wasted a lot of time.”

“We still have time, Daniel.”

Daniel studies the pizza and liberates a slice of mushroom. He can’t see Jack looking intently at him, but he can feel it.

“You think this is the end. For us,” Jack says, softly, realization dawning.

“No, I –”

“Yes. You do. Even after everything we’ve said. _I’ve_ said.”

Daniel immediately regrets getting into this. He just wanted to come here one last time, to be with Jack for a few minutes more.  “Fuck.” It’s a less than erudite response and he knows it. He lets the half-eaten pizza slice drop onto the plate and puts it on the floor, his appetite suddenly gone. Jack shoves the last of the piece in his mouth and follows suit with the plate.

“Coffee table’s gone,” Daniel says, studying the imprint the table feet have left on the rug. At least it’s proof the table was here.  

“Table’s gone, I’m going ... everything goes, right, Daniel?”

Jack should be pissed. Daniel can’t remember the last time he felt and sounded so fucking needy.

“It’s just ...” _Just what, exactly?_ “It should feel like turning a page. Like the chance for new beginnings. Teal’c is at the start of what could be something wonderful for the Jaffa and he’s going to help build it and secure a stable political future for his people. Sam is getting back to what she loves best – pure science and research and the chance to start again, away from memories of Pete. You’re going where your skills will reap the best rewards for the SGC and the program. I’m going to Atlantis ...”

Jack holds up a finger.

Daniel holds up a warning hand. “I am and you know it because that’s where I will be able to put my skills to the best use, which is what the rest of you are doing.” He turns his frustrated gaze to Jack. “It should feel right. It _is_ right. So why doesn’t it?”

Jack half turns towards Daniel and hitches closer, sliding his arm along the back of sofa. His hand rests on Daniel’s shoulder. “Because it feels like an ending to you. And you don’t do endings, Daniel.”  His voice is gentle and affectionate and it’s almost more than Daniel can bear.

Jack brings his leg up until his knee rests against Daniel’s thigh. It feels warm and solid and wonderfully comforting.  “You ascended the first time because the alternative would have meant death and the end of everything you were fighting for. You stayed with the program after we found the Harsesis when you could have walked away and you didn’t.

“That’s what you’re about, Daniel. When one door tries to close, you shove a foot in and stop it happening and keep on keeping on.”

Daniel can’t look at Jack, so he traces the pattern on the rug instead. He hates that he can’t decipher his own feelings on this; beginnings and endings, Jack leaving and losing the team. It’s all wrapped up in one big emotional ball of confusion in his head. But isn’t figuring out puzzles and complex connections what he does? Isn’t this what he’s all about?

Jack sighs, but it’s not an impatient or angry sigh; Daniel’s heard many of those over the years. “It’s because you have no control over the conclusion of this chapter. Before, you chose to ascend, you chose to stay with the program. _You.”_ Jack punctuates his speech with a squeeze of the hand. “The decisions were in your hands and your hands alone. Now ... the end of the team as we know it is being brought about by circumstances and Teal’c and Sam.”

“And you,” Daniel says, finally raising his gaze to meet Jack’s.  “You’re every bit as responsible. Just because you haven’t been going through the Gate with us doesn’t mean you weren’t part of the team this past year. Offworld? Every mission? I still  ... felt you there. Your presence.”

“Teal’c’s favourite Star Wars joke,” Jack says, his mouth curling into a fond smile.

Daniel blinks. He’s used to Jack’s patented non-sequiturs but ...

“Darth Vader tells Luke he knows what he’s getting for Christmas. How? Because he felt his presents.”

Daniel smiles. He can’t help himself.  He remembers Teal’c’s bass rumble of a laugh as he told the joke over cocktails and Twister at Sam’s place the Christmas before he ascended the first time.

The hand that’s on Daniel’s shoulder moves to cup Daniel’s face. Jack’s smile fades and his face is serious and a little sad. He’s so unbelievably beautiful. At one time, Daniel would have used the word handsome, but what he sees, what he feels for this man has gone so far beyond that. Daniel winces and closes his eyes. He needs this touch too much. He can’t imagine how he’s going to cope without it.

“Open your eyes, Daniel. Look at me.”

It takes very ounce of willpower Daniel has to comply, but he does. And when he does, he sees nothing but love and conviction in Jack’s eyes. “This is _not_ the end for us.  And while I can’t guarantee your happy ending, I’ll fight with everything I’ve got to get us there.”

Daniel swallows hard. “I know you don’t want me to go to Atlantis.”

Jack shrugs. “Twas ever thus, Daniel. But you were right.  I’m moving half a continent away. I can hardly demand you stay put just because it makes it easier for me to get us to your ending.”

“Atlantis needs me.” Jack has to see that, even though this parting is killing them both. And really, a continent or a galaxy ...  it’s only further degrees of separation.

“I need you more,” Jack says softly, waiting for Daniel to get it; the call-back to the conversation they had when Jack told him about his promotion.

Daniel breathes out with the pain. For years, they’ve gone round and round in this dance; a swirling endless waltz of duty and honor. There’s no end to the dance in sight. All they can do is hold on to each other as best they can until the music fades.

“But you won’t ask me to stay,” Daniel says, certain of the answer.

“Just as you didn’t ask me,” Jack says, his thumb stroking Daniel’s cheek.

“So ... on we go?”

“On we go.”

And they’re back to the beginning of the dance again.

“I wish I had a dime for every conversation like this we’ve had,” Daniel says, nuzzling into Jack’s hand.

“You’d be a very rich man,” Jack says, smiling. Jack’s gaze is searching, and Daniel knows what he’s looking for.

“I’m okay, Jack. Really.” He looks deep into Jack’s eyes and makes him see the truth of what he’s saying. “I just needed to come over, even though we said goodbye last night.”

 _I always seem to be saying goodbye to you ..._ The words tickle the edge of Daniel’s memory. He has no context for them but he feels the lingering tendrils of pain that accompanied them.

“We never say goodbye, Daniel. We just  ... keep the light on.”

Daniel’s mouth is taken in a soft kiss that is barely there. The touch of lips is achingly tender. Daniel melts into the warmth of the pressure as Jack deepens the kiss and moves closer, his hand coming to rest at the back of Daniel’s neck. It’s like a thousand other kisses they’ve shared but Daniel tastes the promise of love like no other kiss before it. It’s bliss. He wants Jack to kiss him forever.

The knock on the door is startling in the silence.

Daniel pulls back and arches his eyebrows in question.

Jack shrugs in answer, leans in for a final quick, snatched kiss and heads for the hallway.

Daniel hears the door open. “Hi, sir. Sorry to disturb you, but Teal’c and I were passing and saw the lights on and ... we brought dessert.”

Sam comes down the step into the living room, sees Daniel and stops in her tracks, causing Teal’c, who is following, to bump into her. “Oh. Sorry. Are we interrupting?”

“No,” Daniel says, in sync with Jack.

Deja vu; this scene so like another when the team faced an ending.

Sam frowns for a moment then waves the foil trays. “Lemon meringue, key lime and chocolate fudge brownies. Teal’c couldn’t decide so we bought them all.”

Daniel smiles and indicates the pizza boxes on the floor. “Pizza?”

Sam glances at the cold, congealed, half-eaten pie and then back at Daniel. “No thanks. We’ve just eaten at that Vietnamese place. Half-way home, Teal’c had the yen for something sweet, and then we thought that maybe the general hadn’t eaten, what with all the packing, and we tried to call you but your cell phone ...”

“Is switched off.”

“But you’re here anyway so ...”

“Carter ...”

“Shutting up, sir. Do you have dishes?”

“He does, but why bother?” Daniel heads for the kitchen as Sam and Tealc’ make themselves at home on the sofa and Jack offers drinks, which are declined.

Daniel returns with four spoons just as Sam is taking the lids off the cartons and handing one each to Jack and Teal’c. Jack inspects Teal’c’s container and spies lemon meringue, which he duly swaps for his brownies.

Spoons in hand, they each scoop up some dessert.

In a kind of toast, Sam raises her spoon. “To us,” she says.

“To us,” three voices echo in unison.

Daniel catches Jack’s eyes as he delves into the pie. _To us ..._

ends


End file.
